The Home Town Connection

I used to live near this church:

http://www.dailyrecord.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2007701290341

The writer did make one mistake. Yaoundé is the capital of Cameroon, not Douala. Douala is the country's largest city and is the most important center of foreign trade and investment.

Netless

In the past I may have told some of you that I expected to have regular internet access at my post. Forget it. In the last three weeks I've only been able to get on line three or four times for a few minutes here and there. There were two main problems:

First, we had no power for ten days straight and then daily outages of a few hours here and there for several days after that. We have a generator, but since it's expensive to run it they only use it for a few hours in the day and maybe three or four hours at night. That problem was compounded by the fact then when the power goes the server is shut down and they do not necessarily restart it until the next morning. Only one guy has the key, so if he's not around we're out of luck.

Second, they somehow messed up the network cabling in the library, so the PC in the library I was using to get online was not connected to the network. As a result, my only other option was to try to use the computer lab, which is occupied by classes most of the day. For the 2 hours a day it's open, if there's internet access, it's usually full of students so it's pretty much impossible to find an open machine. They've fixed the cabling (for now - nothing is ever fixed permanently in Cameroon) so when we do have power and the server is up at the same time (an iffy proposition) I should be able to get online.

They started to wire the campus so we'd have access in our houses (again, when there's power and the server is up), but that project seems to have stalled. No word on if or when it will resume.

Since these and other problems keep recurring my net access will continue to be sporadic, but I will post here and respond to emails when I can. I will also do some posting on the occasional days when I go to Yaoundé.

On the bright side at least I will have occasional internet access. Many other volunteers have none at all. Funny how quickly we make ourselves dependent on technology huh? Not missing it as much as I thought I would though.

Good Morning!

I am actually writing this post at night, but I just wanted to say "Good Morning!" to everyone out there. These appear to be two English words that every Cameroonian child knows. So they say it whenever they see me walking around campus or in town, even if it is not, in fact, the morning. Therefore it is appropriate that I am writing "Good Morning!" at night. Just a small snippet of what ly daily life in Cameroon is like.

PS - The exclamation mark represents the enthusiasim with which said children always shout the word. Kinda cute actually.

IST in Kribi

After the volunteers in each stage have finished their first three months at post, Peace Corps holds a week of additional training called IST (Inter Service Training). Our IST was held the second week of December near the seaside town of Kribi.

IST is a chance to review everyone's progress at post, talk about problems and successes people are having, and review medical and security training we had during stage. And of course, it's a chance to get another round of shots from the Peace Corps medics.

There are also workshops on developing secondary projects and working with our Cameroonian colleagues. (Each of us was asked to invite a Cameroonian counterpart for the first half of the week.) I usually work pretty independently at school but I brought Souaibou (pronounced swy-boo) - he does a little of everything at the university and since he's chronically overworked I thought bringing him would give him a break. To my surprise they actually let him go.

Outside of town are beautiful beaches to the north and south with lots of beach side hotels, resorts, restaurants, and even a golf course, which cater mostly to foreign tourists (primarily Europeans). Most of the locals assumed we were either French or German.

Cameroonians are not swimmers. I was told that swimming is considered something for children, not adults. One of the counterparts told us that in Kribi there is a local legend about a spirit called "Mami Water" (or maybe it was Mami Water?). If you go swimming in the ocean, you might catch Mami Wata's eye. If you do, she will follow you to shore, and then, when you are at a party or a bar she will approach you in the form of a beautiful woman and seduce you. When you take her home she will reveal herself as Mami Wata and drag you off under the sea as her slave. Makes sense to me.

This was the first time Souaibou had ever been to the ocean. I tried to get him to try swimming. No dice. Best I could do was get him to walk in the surf a bit.

We stayed at one of these hotels. It had great food, air conditioned rooms (first time I've been in air conditioning in months), and was about a three minute walk from the beach. Clean too. It also had some nice courtyards and meeting rooms.

The hotel bar had a keyboard and microphone and two guys who didn't know the words or music to any of the songs they played. I think the keyboard player was playing the same tune to every song anyone sang. They did have Karaoke night though. I sang a truly horrendous rendition of "I Want to Know What Love is" by Foreigner. Volunteer Parker owes me a beer for that one. The best act of the night was Volunteer Ben, who sang a Gilbert and Sullivan number.

Training was decent - it was especially helpful to hear the stories and experiences of other volunteers. We spent a lot of time swapping teaching tactics and talking shop. It was also great to see everyone again. I had a good time getting to know people during training and after three months apart it was good to catch up again.

Our schedule for the week consisted of training sessions and meetings for most of the day (usually til about 4 pm) followed by a trip to the beach and swimming until dark (about 6ish here), and then dinner in town later in the evening. The beaches were great. Water was nice and warm.
We found a nice beach close to our hotel that had a small bar just off the beach, so we did some swimming and then hung out in the bar having a few drinks and watching the sun go down.

Didn't care for the town much. Since it's a tourist burg, the locals pretty aggressively hassle the tourists - street vendors coming up to us during dinner to sell us stuff, beggars, etc. It's also Cameroon's second port (the big one is Douala) so a lot of it had a gritty feel to it. Of course, most of Cameroon has a gritty feel to it, so maybe I was just imagining it. Or maybe Kribi has extra grit. I'm not sure.

One night we were hassled at a bar by one of the local fous. "Fou" means "crazy" in French, so in Cameroon one refers to crazy homeless people as "fous." Ours had fake white hair and a fake white beard painted on. I'm not sure but I think it might have been shaving cream. He was awesome.
Here Volunteer Bill flashes his gang sign while Volunteer Sarah isn't paying attention and Hans (Bill's counterpart) looks on with bemusement.

Since Kribi's on the ocean you could get fresh fish from the street vendors, which is what we had most nights. Ladies with buckets of fish and grills line up on the street selling braziered (i.e. grilled) fish. The normal procedure is to find a lady, have her show you the uncooked fish, haggle over price, then you go sit down in one of the nearby bars and have a beer and when she's done she has a kid bring it to you and you pick it apart and eat it with your hands. It's been gutted, but otherwise all the scales and fins and head are there. I had barracuda one night (pictured). It
was pretty good.
One night in town we had a moment that reminded us of one of the reasons we joined the Peace Corps. One night some of the other volunteers were having dinner at one of the local bars and a Cameroonian approached them. From overhearing their conversation he had figured out they were Peace Corps volunteers. He went on to tell them that when he was a kid in school (he was in his 40s or 50s) he had a Peace Corps volunteer as a teacher. Not only were they apparently a good teacher, but they helped him out by paying his school fees one year when his family didn't have the money. As a result he was able to finish school and went on to become an electrician. After telling them all how much he liked Peace Corps and Americans he bought them all a round and left. Cool story, huh?

We had a whole day off while we were there, so we split into groups and headed to the Lobe falls. The Lobe is a river that runs into the ocean a few kilometers south of Kribi. What's interesting about it is that it ends in waterfalls that flow directly into the ocean. Apparently there are only a few places in the world where that happens. There are also some nice beaches nearby.

Transportation in Cameroon is always an interesting experience. In this case, when we tried to find a taxi to the falls, to save money we all jammed into one taxi. There were eight of us. In a beat up old Toyota corolla. Good thing we all showered beforehand.

After arriving and massaging the feeling back into various body parts, we walked to the falls, which were pretty cool.

Along the way, various locals offered to take us out onto the ocean or up the river in their boats. They excitedly offered to take us to a Pygmy village, which I'm told was a big, depressing rip-off. Other groups went up the river, I got tired of haggling and went to the beach instead.

After swimming for a while, we set off in search of food. We found a neat little restaurant on some rocks over the water. The kitchen was up on top of the rock, and the seating was on shelf below it, and not far past the table was the ocean. We shared a giant platter of shrimp cooked in oil and garlic, another giant platter of fish, and a huge heap of fried plantains that we all shared. It was all quite good. It took a while since they had to go get the food and drinks so we hung out
playing Uno until it was ready.
After dinner we took a taxi ride home that was even more crowded than the first. Since it's outside of town and there aren't many taxis by the falls, we took the driver's number and he agreed to come back for us. We told him to find another taxi driver in town and bring an extra car, but I guess he decided he wanted the cash all to himself. So this time it was ten of us in the same corolla. We all had trouble walking after we got back. With that big a load the bottom of the car was scraping the ground most of the way. The driver had the nerve to complain that we had broken his car and ask for more money. Our response was that he was the one who was dumb enough to put ten people in a frigging corolla.

We had one more day of training and beach time after that, and then we were off. It was a great trip but I was pretty tired by the time I got back to post. Sick too. That's why I ended up just staying home and relaxing for the holidays.

The end of IST was also a little sad, as it was the last time in a while I'll see many of my friends from training since we are scattered all over the country. Oh well, I guess at least we'll all have that many more interesting stories to tell the next time we see each other.

Powerless

Power was down for a few days so I could only get online for a few minutes here and there when the generator and the server were both running at the same time (which wasn't often), hence the lack of posts right after I sent out emails announcing this blog. Figures. "Camerooned" again. Stay
tuned...

Friday Lizard Blogging

My Holidays in Cameroon

Happy 2007 Everyone!

Now that the blog is finally up after months of empty promises, I thought I'd start off with a report on my holidays (you know, now that they're over) and by posting some pictures to appease those who've been bugging me for months to send pictures.

For Thanksgiving a group of volunteers found a little vacation chalet in the mountains near the village of Melong, in the Littoral province in western Cameroon. It took me two days to get there, and on the second day we missed the bus. So, after waiting six hours for a bus that arrived four hours late, we then spent another six hours on the bus. At least the road was paved.

For a little Cameroonian travel ambience, here are shots of a street market at one of our bus stops in the West province, on the way from Yaoundé to Melong:


On the way Volunteer Sarah made a new friend:

We finally arrived in Melong at 8 pm. By then we received text messages from the volunteers at the party that they faced a major crisis. They were running out of beer. So, I was tasked to find a bar in Melong and buy a couple of cases to restock. The volunteer I was traveling with and I managed to find a pair of moto drivers willing to take us up there with our beer, so we each saddled up on a moto with a case of beer perched between the handle bars and the drivers' arms, and endured a 30 minute ride through cornfields and up a horrendous, rock strewn dirt road, but somehow we made it up the mountain to the chalet. The beer made it too, which was of course the important thing.

Since we didn't arrive til 9 pm we missed dinner. Fortunately they saved us plates, so I got to eat turkey (they have 'em in Cameroon) and pumpkin pie after all. The food was good and the Cameroonian staff were nice. There was one guy there serving who was wearing a Chipendale's shirt, which I thought was hilarious. A future post will be devoted to the T-shirst Cameroonians wear. Some assorted pictures of volunteers having fun:

Beds were in short supply, so or lack of other options I ended up in the center of a manwhich between Volunteers Jessie and Charles:

Since we arrived at night, I didn't get a look at the place until the next morning, which was a shame because it really was quite a beautiful area. Here's what I saw when I walked outside the next morning:

This is the outside of the chalet in the pictures above:

This was pretty nice too:
In spite of the long and tiring trip there, I'm glad I went. I got to meet several new people and catch up with others I hadn't seen since finishing training. A good time was had by all.

For Christmas, I was so tired after travelling to and from Kribi (more on that trip in an upcoming post) and then getting sick after the trip that I had no desire to go anywhere or do anything. So for Christmas Eve and most of Christmas day I sat around the house and caught up on sleep. Since all the students and most of the staff were gone for the holidays it was ncie and quiet on campus. For Christmas dinner, I cooked a big pot of beef stew and some spaghetti and invited over some of my friends and neighbors and colleagues for dinner. Again, a good time was had by all:

My New Year's Eve was pretty sedate too. I hung around the house most of the day and then went over to my friend Issa’s house, we he and his wife Hawa were hosting. None of the guests drink so it was a non-alcoholic New Year’s. We watched a lot of Cameroonian pop stars perform on TV. Very interesting – alternately cool, funny, and a bit scary.

For New Year’s Day I was invited over to one of the Pastors’ houses for lunch and had a huge meal. I had barely recovered from that when I went for a walk and got invited into another friend’s house. She and her husband promptly shoved more food at more me. Cameroon is like that - enter someone's house and they will feed you, whether you want food or not. We also watched Cameroonian pop music videos, but since her husband is from an Anglophone province they were in English, which made them even more amusing. I learned that if you are unhappy, don't worry, because 'Disappointment will turn to appointment!' So there. Best song lyric ever.

For my New Year's I was also once again reminded that Cameroonians are a ‘use all parts of the buffalo’ kind of people when it comes to food.

On New Year's Eve Hawa served rice (so far so good) with a beef sauce composed of boiled cow skin. Yummy. On New Year's Day at Marie-Noelle's house the main course was ndolé (pronounced en-doh-lay -hard to describe but a little like spinach) and plantains. Of course, a fried fish head was served on the side – there’s actually more meat in there than you’d think. They normally eat most of it. I broke it up and sucked the meat off so it looked like I’d eaten most of it. Some unidentifiable gelatinous stuff was mixed in with the ndolé, which I later found out was cow tendon. It was about as appetizing as it sounds. The trick is not to chew it - just cut it into small pieces and then choke it down and get it over with. Same with the cow skin.

That was about it for my holiday season this year. The students are back on campus so life is slowly returning to normal. Whatever that is. I’m still figuring it out.

Anyway, happy New Year to everyone out there from the country where 'Disappointment will turn to Appointment!'